Classics and the Western Canon discussion

I am finding this to be a tough text requiring a lot of re-reading, so if you're struggling a little bit I'm right there with you. I think I spent an hour just trying to understand the definitions. In hindsight, that might not have been a good use of time because the definitions start to make more sense as Spinoza uses them and demonstrates what follows from them. By the end of Proposition 17, having read and re-read the previous propositions a few times, I felt his arguments were getting a little clearer. I hope you are having the same experience.

Spinoza begins his Euclidean construction with definitions. Euclid's geometry defines things like points and lines. They're principles and starting points that must be taken for granted if we want to build a rational argument. They may not be right, and if they aren't, the whole thing falls down. I think we have to accept Spinoza's definitions in order to understand them, but he still has to persuade us that these are the right definitions.

Descartes started with the one thing that he said could not be doubted: his own existence. Spinoza starts with something else: existence itself, everything that is and was and could ever possibly be. He calls this "substance". What is substance for Spinoza? My first thought is the universe, the material world. But does it also include ideas or imaginary things? Things that have no material basis?

And why does he call this substance "God"? And given his unusual definition of substance as a self-created, self-conceived everything, Is his argument for the existence of God sound?

The relation to Descartes' "cogito ergo sum" is documented, if any evidence was needed, in an early work by Spinoza, specifically in response to Descartes. He pointed out that the neat formulation takes Latin grammar to be an accurate description of the universe.

Spinoza may have been unusually sensitive to the problem because, in addition to classical Latin and modern European languages, he was very familiar with Hebrew (on which he also wrote a book), and saw that dictum does not translate into it very well.

Nietzsche, a well-trained, if wayward, classical philologist on the nineteenth-century German model, described Descartes' grammatical reasoning here as "a superstition of the nursery." Not surprisingly, he had considerable respect for Spinoza.

Thomas wrote: I am finding this to be a tough text requiring a lot of re-reading, so if you're struggling a little bit I'm right there with you. I think I spent an hour just trying to understand the definitions.

I always seem to struggle with philosophical texts, and when I started this one my heart sank. Will see how far I get and how far behind I will be if I continue. Pessimistic maybe, more like realistic. But I always follow along with the discussion to glean some understanding. Anyway, onward!

I did think since S referred to substance as God or Nature that it wasn't just the material world. In fact, doesn't he make some argument between a transcendent creator versus an immanent one?

I just got my copy in the mail, for now I struggling with the word "affection" (affectio) that is used extensively in the initial propositions (not to be confused with affect (affectus)). e.g. Prop.1 Substance is by nature prior to its affections.
Is it some kind of effect, influence?

According to Wolfson, Spinoza usually uses affectio to mean mode or modification, and affectus for the emotions of the soul. But he points out places where Spinoza seems to have reversed the meanings. Spinoza seems to have had Descartes as an immediate source of both usages, although Wolfson includes a word-study into Greek, Latin, and Medieval Latin usages, which differed among different thinkers.

What is it with philosophers and geometry?

It's said that "Let no one ignorant of geometry enter here" was inscribed above the entrance to Plato's academy. Descartes was an epoch-making geometer, which of course influenced his Rules for the Direction of the Mind. Kant opens his Critique of Teleological Judgement with a detailed geometrical exposition. And then there's Spinoza, who modeled his philosophy on a Euclidean geometry text. I'm sure I could come up with more (Whitehead?).

Spinoza evidently feels that the method Euclid applied to geometry is the way to construct a solid system of metaphysics. I'm not sure I'm convinced of that. I have a feeling that the air of precision which it gives to his thought is unearned.

Geometry, even before Euclid, was treated by Classical Greek (and later Roman) intellectuals as the one methodology that gave clearly and convincingly true results, so long as one followed the correct steps.

Later Christians compared the absolute truths of Scripture (whichever they found in it) to the absolute truths of Euclid.

In the nineteenth century self-consistent alternatives to Euclid were constructed, which made the comparison less convincing.

A few decades ago there was an attempt to ban Non-Euclidean Geometry from schools in Texas as a threat to Christian certainty.

H.P. Lovecraft drew on the concept of non-Euclidean space in a number of his Cthulhu mythos stories.

Angelina wrote: I just got my copy in the mail, for now I struggling with the word "affection" (affectio) that is used extensively in the initial propositions (not to be confused with affect (affectus)). e.g. Prop.1

I also couldn't put my finger on what Spinoza was trying to say with the use of "affections." What I found when I searched for an older definition I got "a mixture of bodies". It still wasn't a great fit to my mind. Ian pointed out affectio means mode or modification. I saw that in definitions as well especially when it relates to a mode that was not natural to oneself or in Spinoza's language - "substance".

I'm not an academic, just an armchair metaphysician, but I have some quibbles with Spinoza. {It should be noted I have the R. H. M. Elwes translation, so the wording in my text may be slightly different from others.]
Def. III: "By substance, I mean that which is in itself, and is conceived through itself: in other words, that of which a conception can be formed independently of any other conception." I suspect that doesn't mean anything.
Def. VI: "By God. I mean a being absolutely infinite, not infinite after its kind: for, of a thing infinite only after its kind, infinite attributes may be denied; but that which is absolutely infinite, contains in its essence whatever expresses reality, and involves no negation." Then God is a mental conception, not something existing in the material universe, because the universe, vast as it may be in space and time, is yet finite. In other words, God doesn't actually exist. Yet S. says God "contains in its essence whatever expresses reality." Is he saying what Aquinas said when he said the essence of God is existence, meaning that it is impossible for God not to exist?
Def. VIII: "By eternity, I mean existence itself, in so far as it is conceived necessarily to follow solely from the definition of that which is eternal." Is he talking about time? Is eternity a duration of time that has no beginning and no end? Since such a duration could never be experienced, this is again a mental conception.
And what does it have to do with existence?
Axioms III & IV: "From a given definite cause an effect necessarily follows; and, on the other hand, if no definite cause be granted, it is impossible that an effect can follow. The knowledge of an effect depends on and involves the knowledge of a cause." Every effect has a cause. Aquinas used this idea to prove the existence of a first cause, which was God.
Prop. VII: "Existence belongs to the nature of substance." S. here gives substance the same essence as Aquinas gave God (see the Summa, Part I, Q. 3). The essence of substance is existence.
Prop. VIII: "Every substance is necessarily infinite." There's that word infinite again. I reiterate that there are no infinite substances in the actual material universe. So substance is again a mental conception.
Finally in Prop. XI S. comes to identify God with substance as something that cannot possibly not exist. (Aquinas's God. I don't know why S. felt the need to get to this point by cobbling God together with substance. Aquinas was far more straightforward.)

Thomas wrote: "I am finding this to be a tough text requiring a lot of re-reading, so if you're struggling a little bit I'm right there with you. I think I spent an hour just trying to understand the definitions...."

I haven't participated in a reading discussion here for some time (not since William James I don't think), but the mention of Spinoza and the subject of ethics really piqued my interest... ethics can be such a tricky subject, trapping things between "good, better, best," for instance.

I was immediately confounded by the abstractions, but I did find some relief in Spinoza's consistent explanations, because he gave some pretty clear and mostly concrete examples of each proposition. I struggled the most at the beginning, but when the subject of God was actually mentioned as the subject, it was somewhat easier to follow, especially since his explanations were far more specific and in depth. At least, so it seemed as it progressed.

Chris wrote: "I did think since S referred to substance as God or Nature that it wasn't just the material world. In fact, doesn't he make some argument between a transcendent creator versus an immanent one?."

That's a nice observation because it goes to the heart of what makes Spinoza's "God" so unusual. This God is not transcendent. God, as Substance, is in everything and so completely immanent. There is no separation between God and everything that exists. I think he even argues that existence itself is dependent on God, which makes sense if God is the absolute ground condition.

Donnally wrote: "I'm not an academic, just an armchair metaphysician, but I have some quibbles with Spinoza. {It should be noted I have the R. H. M. Elwes translation, so the wording in my text may be slightly diff..."

Some comments on your quibbles, which are understandable:

Def. III: "By substance, I mean that which is in itself, and is conceived through itself: in other words, that of which a conception can be formed independently of any other conception." I suspect that doesn't mean anything.

Or else it means everything, literally. Spinoza has to start with a ground condition, a fiat of some sort that has no prior cause. Aristotle has the prime mover, which moves itself; Buddhists have the doctrine of dependent origination, which describes a cyclical existence that has no first cause or final ending; Abrahamic religions have scriptural fiats that simply state that a transcendent being spoke the world into being. All of these stories have problems, but they eliminate the problem of infinite regress. Spinoza's Substance serves this purpose, but it is extraordinarily vague.

Def. VI: "By God. I mean a being absolutely infinite, not infinite after its kind: for, of a thing infinite only after its kind, infinite attributes may be denied; but that which is absolutely infinite, contains in its essence whatever expresses reality, and involves no negation." Then God is a mental conception, not something existing in the material universe, because the universe, vast as it may be in space and time, is yet finite. In other words, God doesn't actually exist.

I have a similar comment scribbled in my text: "Is existence a material thing? Do ideas exist?" I think it turns out that Substance/God is both, since it is also a concept that requires no prior concept. Thought is also substance, which is a very weird notion since it obliterates the difference between subject and object.

Spinoza would of course disagree that the material world is finite. If it's finite, where does it end? On the other hand, if it's infinite, then it is undefinable. That's makes it almost impossible to talk about, and maybe the primary reason this text is so difficult to understand.

About a thousand years of philosophers and later theologians insisting on it, God was acknowledged by all educated people as having no material form: by Spinoza’s time that was expressed as “having no extension in space.” It was debated whether it was appropriate to describe God as possessing Attributes.

Spinoza turned this on its head, and insisted that God, also called Nature, had infinite attributes, but only two, Extension in space, and Thought, could be perceived or conceived of by human beings.

It is not surprising that this drastically different approach produced the claim that Spinoza was an atheist. A term often thrown around to mean “doesn’t agree with my idea of God/gods.”

Donnally: Def. VIII: "By eternity, I mean existence itself, in so far as it is conceived necessarily to follow solely from the definition of that which is eternal." Is he talking about time? Is eternity a duration of time that has no beginning and no end? Since such a duration could never be experienced, this is again a mental conception.
And what does it have to do with existence?

I think he takes time to be in substance, just like everything else. Substance itself is timeless, otherwise time would be an a priori concept independent of substance, and nothing is independent of substance. Eternity cannot be described in terms of time; it has no duration since it has no beginning or end. Maybe substance is an infinite loop of some kind?

There is a Wikipedia article on Cogito ergo sum that is worth reading. It attributes the observation that the dictum is based only on Latin (and French) grammar to Gassendi, without mentioning Spinoza. I may be wrong about this point, perhaps misremembering a discussion I read too long ago to recall properly, like sometime in the early 1970s, when I first studied philosophy in college-level courses.

Angelina wrote: "I just got my copy in the mail, for now I struggling with the word "affection" (affectio) that is used extensively in the initial propositions... Is it some kind of effect, influence?"

Yes, I think so. The big thing about Substance is that it is self-created, self-sustaining, and completely independent. But Substance has to be differentiable somehow or it's just an indefinite blob of everything (or as Spinoza says, "an infinity of attributes that express an infinity of essences".)

Substance/God has to be the cause of its own affects, since nothing else can affect it. That's an interesting way of looking at God as creator... but does that mean that God is therefore ultimately responsible for everything, good and evil?

Thomas wrote: "
but does that mean that God is therefore ultimately responsible for everything, good and evil?"

For me it does! I got this idea when I was twelve while pondering the Christian mythology, that the Fallen Angel wouldn't have had anywhere to "fall", if this "somewhere" hadn't been created by the God that is supposed to be everything and the creator of everything.

Isn't definition #6 just begging the question?

6. By God I mean an absolutely infinite being; that is, substance consisting of infinite attributes, each of which expresses eternal and infinite essence.
Spinoza, Baruch. Ethics: with The Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect and Selected Letters (Hackett Classics) (p. 31). Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.. Kindle Edition.

Spinoza's definition of God assumes certain metaphysical premises from the outset. By defining God as absolutely infinite, consisting of infinite attributes, and expressing eternal essence, Spinoza establishes a starting point that already incorporates key aspects of his philosophical system.

This could be the start of circular reasoning if the rest of Spinoza's arguments rely on this definition without adequately demonstrating its truth among so many competing definitions.

Spinoza is to some extent picking out and juxtaposing elements of standard monotheistic thought through the Middle Ages, and showing that they can lead to unexpected conclusions when removed from their “orthodox” surroundings, and mixed with Spinoza’s little heresy of identifying divine infinitude with that of the material universe. (Which Aristotle and most of his successors were sure was finite, even though Aristotle insisted it was eternal, another flavor of infinity.)

I cannot help but think of Plato's Theory of Forms when I read,

PROPOSITION 5 In the universe there cannot be two or more substances of the same nature or attribute.

David wrote: "Isn't definition #6 just begging the question?6. By God I mean an absolutely infinite being; that is, substance consisting of infinite attributes, each of which expresses eternal and infinite essen..."

It is, or rather it would be, if there were a question. Here he is not making an argument though, or offering a proof. He's positing a definition. LIke Euclid positing that a point is that which has no part, Spinoza posits that God is the absolute infinite.

I don't think such a definition is capable of proof or disproof, unless one can prove that absolute inifinity does or does not exist. So Spinoza is comfortable positing it as a definition. Why he calls it "God" is a mystery to me, but it probably has something to do with the ontological argument for God, which states more or less that God is the greatest thing that can be conceived.

You are probably right about this being a version of the “ontological proof,” the value of which has been debated since St. Anselm proposed it in the Posologion in 1078.

It is not clear whether Anselm originally intended it as a strictly logical argument or as a subject for meditation, but he did defend from early critics, notably Gaunilo of Marmoutiers, whose work he instructed to be copied along with Prosologion and Anselm’s rejoinder. Debate was sometimes carried out in an unexpectedly civilised manner in the Middle Ages.

This was in vogue in the seventeenth century, and Descartes, among others, tried to reframe it in “geometrical” terms. Wikipedia has a useful article on it as “Ontological Argument… to prove the existence of God.”

It points out that similar arguments appear in early Greek Philosophy, again in the Neoplatonists of late antiquity, and possibly in Islamic thought (Avicenna), although the last is disputed.

Thomas wrote: "Why he calls it "God" is a mystery to me, but it probably has something to do with the ontological argument for God ..."

If it is not begging the question, perhaps we can agree to call it a strategic redefinition of God required to support his broader metaphysical view?

When presenting a metaphysical worldview one has to address the God, especially in Spinoza's time. Perhaps it is similar to the way Lucretius explains the Gods as transcendent and non-intervening beings without cares or thoughts for mortals in supportive alignment with his naturalistic metaphysical worldview?

David wrote: "When presenting a metaphysical worldview one has to address the God, especially in Spinoza's time."

Ian wrote: "It was debated whether it was appropriate to describe God as possessing Attributes. Spinoza turned this on its head, and insisted that God, also called Nature, had infinite attributes, but only two, Extension in space, and Thought, could be perceived or conceived of by human beings."

This reminded me of the tentative definitions of God in the Early and Middle Stoa, seen through Max Pohlenz's "The Stoa: History of a Spiritual Movement" (1947), itself a classic and still unrivaled reference on this subject.

Building on the identity: God=Logos, exploring the second identity: God=Physis, moving into the uncharted lands of the third identity: Logos=Physis; nineteen centuries before Spinoza, stoic philosophers recurred to axioms and treated the term God in rather similar ways – wonderful testimony to the continuity of western thought!

David wrote: "If it is not begging the question, perhaps we can agree to call it a strategic redefinition of God required to support his broader metaphysical view?."

I'm not sure what his broader metaphysical view is yet, if this isn't it. (And I sure don't know what any of this has to do with ethics, though i assume he's going to get there eventually.)

It looks like he's trying to construct a purely rational proof-driven explanation of the universe from the ground up. To do that, he has to find solid ground to build on. For Spinoza, solid ground means something has to exist which has no prior cause. The first sentence of this work describes what that looks like: a substance that causes its own existence. This sounds absurd to us because we don't have experience of anything that causes itself, but from a purely rational perspective, something has to be first. For Spinoza, Substance/God is it.

My impression is that every major philosopher from Spinoza’s time was really into mathematics, and infinity always figures prominently. If I remind myself that great minds of the period also believed in alchemy and humours and other semi-mystical ideas, I can start to see why Spinoza leans so heavily on infinity. But, to pick up on Donnally’s phrasing (about Spinoza’s geometric method), “infinity” gives his thought an air of totality, of being absolutely comprehensive, that appears to me to be entirely unearned.

As for another concept I have a heard time accepting in Spinoza, substance, it’s definitely more than physical matter, at least as we colloquially think of matter as the stuff we relate to via our senses. Infinitely more, as it were (Prop. XV, Schol.: “extended substance is one of the infinite attributes of God”). So I take it that only two of the infinite attributes of God are experienced by us. As far as I can tell, these infinite attributes in addition to extension and thought aren’t particularly meaningful; they don’t even strike me as metaphysically meaningful, only mathematical.

Right now, one of my primary interests going forward is to track the way Spinoza uses “existence” and “conception,” often as a pair (maybe similar to how he uses “God or Nature”) and sometimes individually. Insofar as I’m looking for relevance to my own philosophical views, influenced by 20th century phenomenology and existentialism, I’m interesting in this connection between the existence of things and our experience/conception of things.

My second interest is his view of plurality and singularity and how they related to basic concepts like substance, attribute, affection, and mode. For example: “P9: The more reality or being each thing has, the more attributes belong to it.” It’s already weird to me to think of something having more or less reality—I tend to think of being and reality as being binary—but it’s weirder still that when the singular (collective) terms “reality” and “being” increase, the plural term “attributes” increases as well. The increase in “reality” or “being” would have to qualitative, right? Since it’s a singular term. The increase in “attributes” is quantitative. Sorry if this issue seems totally obscure, or if I haven’t explained it well. But it gets to Spinoza’s solution to some of the most fundamental philosophical dilemmas—one and many, universal and particular, for instance—but it looks like he breezes through the dilemma without a thought. Maybe he thinks infinity solves the problem?

This is such a difficult text, I doubt I’ll be able to dedicate the time necessary to thoroughly understand these few concepts that interest me, but they’re what I’ll be thinking about and probably commenting on.

Thomas wrote: "Donnally: Def. VIII: "By eternity, I mean existence itself, in so far as it is conceived necessarily to follow solely from the definition of that which is eternal." Is he talking about time? Is ete..."

His definition of eternity was the most difficult part for me to decipher. Since time is one of my main philosophical interests, I'll try to sort it out as we proceed, but so far the concept doesn't even seem related to time.

What we think of as Time is covered by Spinoza as Duration. Which, even if it is without beginning or end is still distinct from Eternity. I think this makes sense, as, even without Spinoza’s apparatus, it is possible to think of longer or shorter parts of Duration, whereas Eternity is by definition infinite, and dividing it into parts in that manner is nonsensical.

What we think of as Time is covered by Spinoza as Duration. Which, even if it is without beginning or end is still distinct from Eternity. I think this makes sense, as, even without Spinoza’s apparatus, it is possible to think of longer or shorter parts of Duration, whereas Eternity is by definition infinite, and dividing it into parts in that manner is nonsensical.

I've thought that by that time the difference between Eternity and Time (not necessarily by these names) was commonly accepted in European philosophy.

Yes. I could have quoted or cited Wolfson “unfolding” the issue, but for the moment I was just trying to clarify Spinoza, and not describe his place in the philosophical tradition.

Jacob wrote: "Right now, one of my primary interests going forward is to track the way Spinoza uses “existence” and “conception,” often as a pair (maybe similar to how he uses “God or Nature”) and sometimes individually."

I have the same interests. At this point it appears that existence and conception are attributes that are separate in so far as they cannot limit one another (Def 2), but they behave the same way and are subject to the same rules of causation. They run in parallel and are both perfectly rational. But how do they relate to each other? If extension and thought are attributes of substance (or a particular mode of substance) are they simply different ways of looking at the same thing? But then, does it make any sense to think of a concept like Justice as something that has extension, or a block of wood as a thought?

Jacob: My second interest is his view of plurality and singularity and how they related to basic concepts like substance, attribute, affection, and mode. For example: “P9: The more reality or being each thing has, the more attributes belong to it.” It’s already weird to me to think of something having more or less reality—I tend to think of being and reality as being binary—but it’s weirder still that when the singular (collective) terms “reality” and “being” increase, the plural term “attributes” increases as well.

To me this sounds Platonic, at least initially. Plato thinks that the more something partakes of Forms/Ideas, the more "reality" it has. (Because for Plato the Forms/Ideas are where Being comes from, and the more perfect or Form-like a thing is, the more it exists. Which is to say that everyday reality of experience is not perfectly real.)

When Spinoza defines an attribute as what the intellect perceives as constituting essence (D4), that also sounds Platonic. And apparently the more attributes a thing has, the more "reality" it has. (P9) But Spinoza's attributes don't appear to admit of degree -- a substance has them or it doesn't -- which is not how Plato's Forms work. So not so Platonic. Especially if there are only two attributes that we perceive, and it isn't even clear how those two relate to each other.

I have read about Spinoza before but this is the first time I am actually reading his book. As Thomas said, it demands some reading and re-reading. During my first reading, I have decided to try to understand more of the definitions through the axioms and propositions. So I was much more focused on the logic exercise itself. And it was a pleasure! As an engineering, I love this math language and logic!

Then I went back to explore more of the concepts and to link everything back to what I knew about Spinoza and naturally I have found out that it is much richer and deeper and more elegant than what I learnt during my college discussions.

Monica wrote: "Then I went back to explore more of the concepts and to link everything back to what I knew about Spinoza and naturally I have found out that it is much richer and deeper and more elegant than what I learnt during my college discussions."

I love this, Monica! It's the reason this group exists -- the Great Books have always been the best teachers, though not often the easiest to understand. I'm finding Spinoza to be both highly methodical and also somewhat mystical, a strange and thrilling experience. I'm glad we have an engineer with us to help us examine the structure of this difficult work.

Ian wrote: "What we think of as Time is covered by Spinoza as Duration. Which, even if it is without beginning or end is still distinct from Eternity. I think this makes sense, as, even without Spinoza’s appar..."

Regarding the comments on time. Maybe I am missing it; my apologies if I am, but I don't think Spinoza is talking about eternity as some immeasurable duration of time here. He writes,

8. By eternity I mean existence itself insofar as it is conceived as necessarily following solely from the definition of an eternal thing. Explication {32} For such existence is conceived as an eternal truth, just as is the essence of the thing, and therefore cannot be explicated through duration or time, even if duration be conceived as without beginning and end.

These examples helped me wrap my head around what I think he is getting at here:

Eternal Truth: Think of a mathematical truth like 1+1=2. This truth exists because of its definition and logic, not because of any specific time period. It’s eternal in the sense that it’s always true and doesn’t depend on time passing.

Essence and Existence: Imagine the essence of something like a circle, e.g., its roundness. The fact that circles are round is not going to change over time.

A bachelor may not always be a bachelor, but a bachelor is always an unmarried man.

Time and Eternity seem to be incommensurable, but they must relate in some way. I would expect them to relate in the same way that substance and modes do -- modes are somehow "in" substance (because everything is in substance) but at the same time are not parts of substance. Or put another way, individual beings (as modes) are "in" God but are not gods themselves.